Housing

There are a number of ways to house rabbits. Colony style and stand-alone hutches are a few options that won’t be fully addressed here. The amount of money spent on stand-alone hutches, if store bought, is high for the lack of
longevity of the hutch. They become a large, expensive chew toy and are not designed with the interest of the rabbits in mind. Colony style or “semi-free-range” Is also an option, but also inhibits efficient breeding, feeding and tracking of genetics. In a colony style rabbitry, does, bucks and offspring are left together and allowed to eat until the food is gone, breed with whatever suits their fancy and interact with whatever pathogens are in the soil. Free feeding causes obesity, obese does and bucks are reluctant to breed. Without the ability to track genetics, inbreeding takes place much more frequently and deteriorates the gene pool.
Rabbits that are allowed to dig in the soil will come in contact with more pathogens than those that are kept in regulated conditions.

The most efficient housing for rabbits is the modular or “stacked” style. They make the most use of the volume of a room or building. They are easy to clean and to organize. In a very small foot print one can raise TONS of rabbits efficiently and cleanly. The rabbit raiser can track breed cycles, genetics, feed rations, temperaments, and other useful information.